ONLY two years in operation, the country’s antitrust body has attained its first ISO certification recognizing the quality of its services.
The Philippine Competition Commission (PCC) on Monday announced it was awarded ISO 9001:2015 certification for its quality management system. This is in recognition of the agency’s delivery of public services, such as mergers review, enforcement operations and policy research.
According to the PCC, its ISO certification covers reviews of mergers and acquisitions, competition law enforcement and competition policy formulation and research. It also includes capacity building and advocacies that are compliant with international standards of service.
The recognition was achieved by the PCC in spite of only two years in operation. This made the antitrust body the only ISO-certified public body among national government agencies organized since 2016.
“The certification is a testament to PCC’s strong commitment to consistently execute its mandate toward merger reviews, enforcement cases and other operations that meet
international standards.
This demonstrates PCC’s ability to provide quality and timely regulatory and enforcement requirements,” PCC Chairman Arsenio M. Balisacan said.
The certification is valid until November 20, 2021, after being reviewed by Germany-based auditor TUV Rheinland.
“As the PCC quality policy emphasizes, the commission shall continually commit to fulfill our mandate as a quasi-judicial agency, achieve our mission to prohibit anticompetitive practices, attain our vision of becoming a world-class competition authority, and improve our systems and processes to ensure the highest level of satisfaction of all our stakeholders,” Balisacan added.
The ISO 9001:2015 certification is the latest version of the ISO standards, which is internationally accepted for quality management. It is considered a seal of recognition for organizations that are able to provide effective customer and regulatory services.